Author here! This chapter is very much about getting the story lined up and ready for the events that will begin to take place in the next chapter. I'm super motivated at the moment so work is coming out faster than it likely will in the future. I am particularly motivated by this story at the moment, hence the speedy updates, however in the future it will likely be a fortnightly update, rather than a new chapter every few days. That being said, please stick with me, I anticipate a few more chapters like this throughout the story, as well as the more exciting ones.

Having said all of that, I am aiming to have the next chapter up and running by Sunday at the latest. Like I said, motivated.

Disclaimer: I don't own Phantom of the Opera or any of its characters, anything you may recognise I credit to the brilliant Gaston Leroux.


Chapter One:

I found my Angel a ghost of a man, a shell of his former self, but then so was I.

I bent down as he looked up at me, shivering, holding on to survival by a thread, bruised, battered, starving. It tore at my heart, he flinched as I moved to take off my cloak and put it around his shivering form. I could hardly see him in the alley but for the flickering light of the street lanterns lighting carriage's way through the snow.

Cuts and bruises littered his broken body and face, a white makeshift mask laying all but shattered a few feet from him.

"I don't need your help." He hissed, shrugging off the cloak only to have me force it back on him.

"Don't be so stubborn." I shot back, earning his shock. With a raised brow his eyes met mine, startling green surrounded by bloodshot red and the deepening yellowish purple that was a bruise just beginning to heal. "How long have you been like this?"

"A week? Maybe two. I'm not sure, the days seem- why are you here Christine?" He cut himself off, his melodic voice was gravelly, broken, with lips gone blue from the cold and the reddened distortion of his face seeming darker, the lumps and hallows more prominent somehow.

But I remained silent, ignoring his question. Because I didn't know if I would like the answer? Wasn't this the nameless Phantom who I'd fought so hard to be free of? Wasn't this a monster? The Wicked Opera ghost?

I'd fought to be free of a monster, someone who killed without provocation and delivered no mercy. But I'd no proof this opera ghost had done any of those things, Raoul could have been nothing but an empty threat meant to sway my mind…

Raoul. Three months with Raoul had cast a light on things hidden by romance and fear. Real monsters don't look like it, they don't act like it, and they know no one would believe you if you screamed. Raoul was a monster sheltered by wealth and hidden by the rays of the sun.

But the more I thought of it the more preposterous the idea of leaving this ghost of a man was. And he did look like a ghost right now.

"Come now, no one will be home for hours yet." I sighed, knowing this was a bad idea. What if one of the maids saw him? They worked for Raoul not me and would go running to their master. This wasn't playing with fire, this was all but lighting the fuse of a bomb, and eventually it would go off…

And yet with the looming threat of Raoul's wrath and this creature's obsession being re-ignited, I hid the distorted face of a dark angel in the hood of my winter cloak and piled his broken body into a carriage headed for the house.

Monsieur Fantôme didn't speak a word on the carriage ride there. He sat across from me, clutching the cloak for any warmth it could provide and critically assessing me with stern eyes in his very own shade of green. When the carriage stopped, he looked out the window and then shot me a seething glare, like I'd just reopened an old wound.

"Palace De Chagny." Read a silver plaque pasted above the elaborate front door.

"Breathe. He'll be gone for hours yet." I sighed, opening the door and leading him towards the front entrance of the house, quickly dropping a bag of money in the driver's hand and shouting back a quick thank-you.

"You wouldn't bring someone like me here while he was home?" he spat, moving to walk by himself and almost crumbling to the floor before I used whatever strength I had to drag him back up, putting his arm around me before moving on.

"I try not to bring myself here when he is home." I grunted under the weight moving us both slowly up the stairs.

"What's wrong? Is marriage not everything you hoped?" I couldn't see his face, but I knew he was snarling down at me. He didn't want to be here and maybe he would have let himself freeze, or starve. I didn't know, but he wasn't exactly trying to fight his way out of the carriage on the way here.

I pulled him up the last few steps, resisting the temptation to let go and allow gravity to do what it will. "We're not married." I grunted, leading him into my room and locking the door behind us, not willing to risk anyone walking in.

Forgetting the dirt and grime that covered the Phantom I removed my cloak and his coat and shoes before ordering him under the warm blankets of my bed -white sheets be damned- with a stern glare, leaving him shivering while I started the fire. A chore I'd not needed to do for myself in months but like most things it came back, much like riding a bike.

"Why aren't you married?" He asked, eyes following me as I moved closer to him, perching on the edge of the bed, the fire beginning to roar to life behind me. Already it was warmer. "I would have married you by now."

"I know you would." I stared at my hands, clasped together in my lap. "You are many things Raoul is not."

His stare turned cold before he turned his face away. "I'm aware."

"That's a good thing." He flinched as I moved over him, feeling for the fever I knew would come. At my steady gaze he relaxed visibly, the tension leaving his shoulders and his eyes softening. "Stay here, I'll be right back, you need food."


Getting the oversized lump resting in my bed to eat anything had resulted in an argument of colossal proportions. In the end, he'd managed half a bowl of broth and a few bites of bread before passing out with the phrase. "I'm not sleeping, I'm only resting my eyes."

And then there was a rather abrupt knock on my bedroom door. And I felt my heart thud into my stomach.

Unlocking it, I opened it just enough so I could see out… the unimpressed face of a red-haired woman greeted me.

"Elizabeth!" I forced a smile on for the woman who had become the closest thing I had to a friend over the past few months.

"Hello dear! Forgot about our tea date, did you?" She raised her brow as she forced herself into the room, eyes darting to the man sleeping beneath my covers, as I rushed to close and lock the door and she tossed the large package in her hands onto the decorative chair in the corner and grinning at me like the cat who ate the canary. "Why Christine, I didn't know you had it in you, not yet wed and already with a lover! How exciting!"

"It's really not like that at all." I started quietly, not wanting to wake him and wondering what she must think. He was still dirty from his time in the alley, but food and warmth were more of a pressing concern than hygiene at this particular moment.

Suppressing a giggle, she said "Do you just pick them up off the street or- oh my god!" she gasped as she walked around him, seeing the other side of his face.

"Elizabeth! Blasphemy." She ignored me, eyes darting between me and him.

"Is that-"She bent in closer to look. "Is that Him?"

She didn't scream or faint or retch… she looked like a child on Christmas morning as she all but ran over to me and grasped my hands, she looked… giddy.

"This is not the reaction I expected." I deadpanned.

"My life is tea parties and galas, this is the most exciting thing to happen to me in years!" At my reaction- or lack thereof- she added. "I do read you know. Phillipe tries so very hard to hide the papers, but I must have my entertainment." She looked back at him and frowned. "Not nearly as bad as the papers made it out to be."

I just stared at her. I didn't mind his face so much anymore, in fact, I'd never even been repulsed by it, but it was shocking, it's simply not what people were supposed to look like.

As if reading my mind, she made a completely unladylike sound before continuing. "My sweet naïve Christine, you forget I am a lady of the court, and you have not seen some of the royals. Hideous and boring! They say its incest that does it. In any case, from what I've read at least your Opera Ghost has a personality, albeit an eccentric one."

"You need to go." I groaned as a headache started to rise. Elizabeth was kind in her own way and certainly never dull… but all things in moderation. Too much and a migraine lasting days would begin to arise. Maybe it was her perfume?

"Yes, yes. Quite right. Wear the dress tonight hm?" She said moving to pick up the large package and giving it to me. "I had it fit to my measurements, we can't be too terribly different. High neck, blue silk." Her dark eyes rested on my neck for a moment and I burned red. She knew.

"I shall see you later this evening!" She called out as she tottered down the stairs, bowling past the servants in the process.

I glanced over at the man curled up in my bed mildly concerned. I hadn't taken him for a deep sleeper.


I decided to end this one here because it was starting to get a little lengthy for me. Short and sweet and all that.

Once again, the review button is below, always interested in what you might have to say.

I realise I have portrayed Christine in a slightly different light, I don't mean to undermine her entire personality. But one of the things I did really like about Christine in 'Love Never Dies' was the moments of strength they gave to a typically (how do I say this nicely?) demure character. I completely understand that her personality is a reflection of her time and I think that's so important. But I did want to show how she's changed since leaving the opera, and I wanted to bring attention to how she acts around Erik vs how she acts around Raoul. Certainly, in the 2004 film version -which this is mostly based off- I thought Christine was much quieter and sweeter with Raoul, and more passionate with Erik.

All of this I hope will become more evident in chapters to come.